Should game rules reward commitment, i.e., more points for more time playing?

I do not agree with the idea of rewarding based on commitment. If this were the case, then people would have no reason to STOP playing. This will surely cause problems when the committed players begin to remember the "reality" they've put into the back burner for who-knows how long. Investing too much time into a game would it less of a game, but more of a reality that is entirely unreachable. Society today already has enough trouble keeping people away from games and other sources of entertainment media long enough for them to realize that they have lives outside of a monitor. Rewarding commitment in games is simple another incentive for players of all occupations to stay on for another couple of hours; time which could have been used in a more productive manner.

I do not think that players should receive more points for the time they log. Everyone who participates in the game should have equal opportunity to succeed. There may be many people who are dedicated to the game but do not have as much extra time to play. They should not be disadvantaged because other people have more free time to play than them. People have their real lives to deal with and therefore may not have much time to spend on the game but that does not make them any less dedicated.

Awarding players for the amount of time should not be instituted. From personal experience, I normally open a site and walk away from my computer sometimes for hours doing other things. My forgetfulness and even sometimes my laziness should not be awarded. Rather I think that as others have stated that it is the work that you put in to the website that should be awarded. I know this may be difficult to record each persons contribution to the game it would be more rewarding to the individual if they actually earned it.
ALso, awarding for time spent on the game may discourage other potnential players. People may visit the game occasionally between tests and school or work and would not feel that they could compete with people that are on all the time if they were rewarded. People that were on longer would gain an advantage that people with pressing responsibilities coulg not gain.

I completely agree. If time commitment were awarded, then all people would have to do is just open up the game, go AFK, and then go do something else. There could be measures to prevent this, but there would also be ways to circumvent it. Games that require an actual person to be there (i.e. World of Warcraft's PvP aspect) would be terrible if people just went AFK all the time and still gained experience. It ruins the gameplay for everyone when a group event has missing people. This goes somewhat with the aspect of paying money to gain an edge in the game by buying all the top of the line items. People would be discouraged from playing. Some people just don't have the time to commit to actually playing the game so they find the next best thing in "cheating" their way to the top in the shortest time possible.

i dont think players should be rewarded for playing more. it's their own choice, and the truthfulness of what they believe doenst nec increase with the time they spend on the website. that is to say, someone who visits very few times still adds to the game. maybe some of us have finals to study for and cant spend a whole bunch of time playing the game - that doesnt mean we dont care or havent invested real thought into our answers.

furthermore, those who have a lot of points accrued from spending time on the site have more points to protect and maybe their motive for being on the website isnt as true to the spirit of the site as a political theory experiment as could be, but rather a way of maintaining high points

“maybe some of us have finals to study for and cant spend a whole bunch of time playing the game - that doesnt mean we dont care or havent invested real thought into our answers.”

I think this point is very important. Investment in a product shouldn’t be measured with time. Doing so would discourage having multiple interests and well-roundedness and instead encourage spending all of their time on one thing, never expanding beyond the narrow boundaries of a particular project. For instance, if one was to spend all of their time on the game they would be able to gain a lot of insight into other cultures and politics, but they would be limiting their other interests. Less devotion would be able to be given to schoolwork, social life, and extracurricular activities (writing, artistry, sports, etc.).

Game rules should not reward commitment in terms of time playing but rather the type of work that has been accomplished. The reward system if established, should seek to reward efficiency and commitment in terms of the type and quality of work that is accomplished not the commitment in terms of dedication and time played.

I totally agree with this, it is important to institute some sort of differentiating reward system to motivate players to accomplish goals, if no achievements were given out then why would a person invest so much effort into the system when his neighbor does nothing and achieves the same? Interest in the game would decrease. This is a difficult situation as it partially alienates the equality system as everyone has different thresholds of ability. In this way though, we should mediate necessity over luxury, rewards shouldn't be represented as an advantage but rather a token of commitment. But then again this does have conflicting interest with equality....